Date: Wed, 9 Apr 2003 01:41:40 -0600
From: thomas
Subject: FULLERTON PARK AND RIDE
FULLERTON PARK & RIDE (M/m, M/f, inc., rom., lit;, humor.)
By
Tom Emerson
He looked tense; engaged, concerned, and perhaps, most of
all, attentive. I'm not the dish of dishes, or anything, but had the luck
to be smart enough not to wreck a decent natural build at Pizzas And More,
so a glance or two comes my way. Since I'm not gay in any overt sense of
the word, and happy in my closet, to boot, I pay next to no heed. But here
were two locked on eyes. "Can I stay here for the layover?" he asked. I'd
parked my bus in Fullerton a minute ago, this one boy remaining. The
layover was fifty minutes.
"Okay," I said, wondering half way through the word exactly
how gay I wasn't.
He settled back in his seat, the closest to mine and facing
mine. He was dressed in slacks and a button-up shirt, schoolish. Maybe
twelve years old, not to-die-for in the looks department, but just a nice
looking standard issue kid.
"Are you friends with the regular driver?" I asked, being
an extra-board operator, myself, and thus something of a permanent
substitute.
He nodded.
"I'm Tom," I said, not shaking the tree, but simply because
the boy was sitting four feet away and it would have been awkward to mute
out for almost an hour.
"Henry/Hank," he responded, "either or."
"I'll decide before I head back for Los Angeles," I
promised, and he smiled.
There was more to our proximity than the dialogue
indicates. Henry was displaying. Not humping or doing stuff with his
mouth; nothing overt, just an obvious boner, most of six inches, jutting
toward his belt. Such a full invitation, so fast. I was in Los Angeles to
make money fast and return to the Caribbean, and other than dissolute
attendance at the half dozen advertised bath houses, had remained celibate
for the better part of two years. Under other circumstances, this might
have been a strain, but I was, even after two years, still fresh from my
relationship with Jose (chronicled in other works), and its perfection left
memories needing no revivals. Even the bath houses were far more alluring
to the writer in me than the pervert; in fact, in spite of a
thirty-two-inch waist and teen bod, I'd scored seldom and only rarely even
well, much less spectacularly. No problem, it was close eyewitness
observation of dozens, and perhaps even some few hundreds, of males on the
prowl. Point of fact, I'd lost interest in sex for the time being, money
came first, proving that artist temperament notwithstanding, I could slog
it out on a menial track and save gobs of money. At the moment Hank asked
to stay I shared a distinct characteristic with the coach I was operating.
We were both in Neutral.
It took but a few seconds to realize I had another bond
with the lead sled I was driving. Inertia. I couldn't think of a thing to
say, weakened, at this moment of trial, by an ultra-blue-blood New England
heritage that frowned on "Nice dick, kid," brevity on meeting a stranger.
"Do you know Jun Solvein?" the boy asked, helping
substantially.
"Yes," I said, "definitely. We're part of a non-black
coalition of ostracized drivers. I see him almost every day."
"Are you Tom?" he asked.
I replied in the affirmative.
"He says you're really rich," the boy said, with a smile.
"I write on racial issues; politics, culturalism, subjects
like that," I replied, "So I do this to hang out in Compton and Watts, and
I'm not rich, I have just one million dollars and it provides a very modest
private income, way the hell under thirty K a year."
"Well," my new young friend noted, "he likes you even if
you are rich and smart."
"His father was Ambassador of the Philippines to Japan," I
said, "they probably have more shoes than I have dollars." This made the
boy giggle and his eyes sparkle. What? Brain and kid in one pack? What
were the odds? Of course, Hank was mostly right. I was rich, thirty grand
in the checking account will never be poor for someone obsessed with owning
little and owing nothing, and Jun always had to come in on Fridays, even
when he was off duty, to get his check to the bank before the Visa man
flicked him into the heady stratosphere of twenty-seven percent interest.
Maybe I was richer than I knew.
"Has he sung the Coral Ode to you in Japanese?" was the
boy's next question, and I supposed I fell in love with him there and then.
"Yes," I said. It seemed a talent beyond comprehension, but any musical
citizen of Nippon could do it, leaving it still sounding beyond
comprehension.
Again, the Puritan lash, the proper Pilgrim with his whips,
chains, and faggots. Not only did they not tell their indoctrinees how to
chat with nice boy with a big boner, they held such intercourse as
heathenish outrage and the handmaiden of perdition. Lots of help. What
they really needed was to be stocked in place in the bedroom of a
non-conforming couple. It's not that I live to defy them, just that they
had their day, now it's ours. Thus internally emboldening myself, I
spaketh:
"Do you guys sit up here, or go in back?" I asked the
friendly kid.
"We go in back," he answered.
"Was it because the side seats were plastic and the coach
seats upholstered?" I wondered to myself, feeling stupid enough for three
people because Hank had continued his mild display unabated. I'm not the
strong silent type, acing a p.t. test or two along the way,
notwithstanding; I like to talk, twice as much to listen, given the least
degree of wit and insight in the companion, yet here I was moving to the
back of the coach closely behind a ninety pound male child, and silent as a
lamb. Hank picked the next to last seat on the right side of the vehicle,
sitting with his knees in the passage. I sat opposite.
I liked Jun but I didn't respect him, so that wasn't likely
as a topic of conversation. When I was at my embryonic computer (this all
happened in '89) I only used the word processor and thus had but a cursory
acquaintance with games like "F-16 Strike Eagle" and "Silent Service", RGB
graphics having discouraged much play of games I bought, I realize now,
based on the artwork on the box. Yes, these were the heroes of the
revolution, the anonymous airbrush masters who tempted the simple minded
with graphics that would exceed those of the product for the best part of
fifteen years, but packaging aside, gaming made a paltry thing-in-common
Jun was off limits because he'd just spent nine hundred dollars on a
pistol, at the same time telling us (our group of seven or eight
non-blacks) of his dream of returning to Manila and starting his own
business. His was a developing saga of total failure amidst bountiful
cash, as he lived with his parents and spent everything he had, plus
decades worth of what he didn't yet have. On the other hand, he was cute
and of mixed Japanese ancestry, in the first place, making him a gentle
eyeful. Hank was a lucky boy.
We sat some moments in perfect limbo. I knew as a fact
nodding even slightly or reaching my hand even an inch would result in
pre-teen in arms. And I can't blame all those crusty ancestors, entirely,
either, for my mute state, because even in that time, as this, I was less
than two feet from rape, never mind who crossed the gap. This didn't
bother me as much as you might think, for I'd raped Jose any number of
times, always to his caresses and grunting gusher of hot sperm; my sister,
and a handful of Mexican children who'd followed me home, leading if it was
the second time and they knew the route. Los Angeles is nothing if not
paranoid, so, as I sat there visions of a twinkie transit cop's son, or
infrared lenses that could penetrate the tinted windows of the bus joined
the Calvinists and sundry zealots of times gone by in setting up vibes even
a person of the Fifties would have recognized as a downer. I did all this
thinking fast, mind you. Hank was as nervous as I was; might whisper
Sorry, at any moment, and head out on his business.
"Do you spend most of the time back here with him?" I
asked, it was all I could think of, referring to the fifty-minute layover.
"The first time we talked quite a bit before we came back,"
the boy said, "but we both liked what happened, so now we come in back as
soon as the last passenger has gone."
"Did you like that talking part?" I asked.
"Yes," the boy said without hesitation, "it turns out we're
both John Irving fans, so we have something to talk about besides personal
stuff." That was unknown to me, that Jun read; I didn't know quite what to
think: wasn't half the purpose of reading, in the first place, to learn
from the foibles of others and gain the perspective to live your life
rather than letting it live you? H'mm. We could save that. The kid read,
one thousand points.
"Hank," I said, "I'd say this more diplomatically if we had
more time, hint around and stuff, but what I'm interested in knowing is if
you want something that just happens once, or a relationship. I'm totally
free," I went on, "and like being around boys your age as much if nothing
happens as much as if something does."
"I'm looking for that, too," the boy responded quickly.
"not with Jun, he's just cute and fun."
"I wouldn't tag you or take a license out on you," I
assured my new friend, "but I just want to be freaking times two sure I'm
not stepping on anyone in any way. I am rich, and it may go to my head
sometimes, but not elsewhere, except at Boy's Town in Nuevo Laredo."
"No," the boy said, "there's nobody, so to speak; anyway,
nobody who'd start pacing suspensions bridges with an indecisive air."
"It shouldn't be emotional, as far as I'm concerned," I
said, "that's bad enough with legal and socially approved pairings, and as
far as I can see all it does is turn a boy into a fag, all issue-bound and
acting out, and that can't be much of a life unless you have the odd
megawatt of commercial-grade talent."
"Even leaving emotions out," Hank said, "I'm closer to you
in a few minutes than I could get to him in a year, or anyone else, for
that matter."
"So?" I asked, "would you like to date?" I'd never used
the word with Jose; thought of our being together in that context, or as a
`relationship', but here it seemed to fit, and certainly suited the
abbreviated time allowed for our preliminary courtship.
"How's this for an answer," the twelve year old said, "we
have a nice room to rent across the hall from mine, at the opposite end of
the house, if you follow."
There were many incipient risks in play, but one of them
was not going to be getting ahead of Hank.
"And you live with..."
"One mom, no dad, and Henny."
"And Henny eats..." I didn't know if I was dealing with
pet or persona.
"Cheerios with strawberries," the boy said. "She's nine."
"And your mother is going to feel about having a stranger
in the house with a young daughter..."
"Relieved," the boy answered. "She grew up in a Free
Spirit house, and wants the same for us, but it's a pretty big deviation,
so only very, very right people are appropriate."
"A hook like you, baited with books," I said even then
being something of a writer  and I'm surprised you're not booked
through your grandchildren."
"We're late onset," the boy explained. "Mom kept us pure
and innocent until Henny was her, mom's, age when she, mom, became a Free
Spirit. Now I guess they call it more like Bonobo."
It seemed we had more in common as we went along, so I
applied my heels gently to the winning horse.
"Are you and Henny close?" I asked, not staring at his
penis, but glancing just a mite.
"That happened when I met Jun," the boy said, sparing in
his use of language, yet managing to say a lot.
"Besides books, did you and Jun talk about other things,
you know, more personal?" I asked.
"Yes," the boy said, blushing slightly.
"I want to know," I added, "because for some boys it would
be nice if something happened, but they don't want to talk about private
stuff; others are more open, and then there's the ultimate set who talk and
sigh and lisp and carry on; so, yes, I'd like to kind of quiz you, and yes,
it's cool if that's not your cup of tea."
"I'm in the middle group," Hank said. He did play to the
moment by puffing a pretend breath at me, then, before alarm could raise
its ugly head, his charade dissolved into a typically boyish smile and I
breathed an inward sigh of relief. I'd dallied once in my life with a
hustler, and his penis hand felt like soft, cold rubber; an acting-out fag
or totally here and queer? Never. Dame Edith, any age, any conformity, is
still Dame Edith; nothing awesomely against them, except they provoke
curbing and other retributions against the more closet happy who happen to
enjoy not being all awash in mannerism and display, as long as they keep to
their side of the feather boa.
"Me, too," I repeated, "a lot the first few times, then
less and less until we've shared everything worthwhile without annoying
anyone."
"Ditto," the young reader said with a nod, and I sat there
for a moment giving my psyche time to rid the scene of emotion. "What if
he's perfect?" I bespoke to my conscience, and he reminded me Jose had
been, absolutely, and we'd parted as happily as we'd met. In my turn, I
pointed out to the operator in chief of my moral compass that Jose was of a
different race, stunning, craggy beauty though he was, and spoke no English
while I spoke next to no Spanish. He, my small c, shrugged and named me as
the writer in our duo; bid me exchange him for my muses, as he'd found my
prosaic life, bath houses and all, unchallenging. Apparently not much of a
challenge in Hank either. I don't dwell on these internal dialogues,
awaiting the free time inherent with commitment, and small c was free to go
in search of bolder opportunities, but, since he'd been a diligent partner
for some odd years, I felt it fitting to dismiss him with a final joke and
see what happened. Because he'd been tuned in all along, I was able to
reduce my attempt at humor to a single word between myself and my
conscious: Henny. Yes, the door slammed, but he was still inside it, in
fact, was not even so abashed as to delay in the rolling up of his sleeves.
"Hank," I asked, "do you want something to happen here,
now, or should we wait until tonight when I move in."
"It's been kinda like a week," the boy said.
Again, alarm bells. I though for a minute. "Henry," I
said, "are you sure you're not saying things, like inviting me over, on,
you know, sort of the spur of the moment, you know, based on present
circumstances."
"I don't think so," the boy replied, more confidence in his
voice than his words warranted. As I've gone on to become a real writer,
I've learned to exercise a thinking-things-up talent, but I'll have to
admit even back in '89 I was beginning to get the hang of this essential
quality of the novelist and short story writer.
"I can think of a way to have the best of both worlds," I
said.
"How?" the boy asked.
"It's pretty graphic," I warned him, "and I use prude
language, not the hard stuff."
"That's okay," the boy said, now whispering.
"The graphic part or the language part?" I asked in turn,
embarrassed at having confused the situation in my haste to learn what the
answer would be.
"Both are okay," the boy said.
"What I thought," I went on, concealing substantial inner
joy, "is you could stand against me, between my legs, and I could take you
inside my shirt  I've got paper towels in my bag. That way, tonight
will remain special, and you'll, a, get some physical relief, and, b, be
free to have second thoughts without any undo influences."
Jose and I had been avidly and frequently together because
I'm that kind of guy; not only that, but in those days I was another
Hollywood wannabe, less a legend in my own mind, and probably a teensy
smidge less conceited, and therefore a nicer chap than I am since becoming
widely published and substantially read. In any event, Hand stood and
moved between my legs, his zipper against the buttons of my uniform shirt.
"Let's not kiss or touch in any way we don't have to," I
suggested as I looked up into his regular dirty-blond-framed schoolboy
face.
"Will you stay with me all night?" he whispered in
response.
"Yes," I said, "and candles, too. I think you're beautiful
and I want to see everything."
"Me, too," the boy said.
It was summer, no tee shirt. He pressed gently, and I, in
turn, leaned to him. We found comfortable positions and the child was able
to brace himself so he could spread his legs and display by placing his
hands behind his neck and arching his back slightly. Once in position, he
froze; good news, because the hustler in Denver had thrust like a machine
and hissed like its boiler, then produced a cold worm of no great size. I
longed to molest the cutie, pull free his shirt tales and run my fingers up
over his belly and chest. He was differently built than Jose, who differed
in no way from an athlete; softer, less formed, more childish, and
undoubtedly with skin so soft it became electrical at the slightest caress.
Too bad.
As we came fully together, I found his zipper and slowly
released him from his underpants. I couldn't see the color of his briefs,
but was relieved to find they were regular size and cotton. If he wanted
to parade around in a thong or super briefs, say once a month, we'd be on
the same page, but silky undergarments on a male bespeak monotonous
narcissism, and I avoid it and them, except for casual friendships, as I do
the boa.
He was extraordinarily hard. Jose had been of substantial
African blood. African males are larger than Anglos, but do not get as
hard, nor swell as much when they get hard. So there was a kind of cute
difference between boy one and boy two. I opened the middle four buttons
of my shirt and guided the child to my now panting and perspiring chest.
Now he began thrusting gently as I coaxed him to me with both hands. He
was now nearly twice the size I'd projected looking at the bulge in his
pants  a very Anglo boy. His penis had been circumcised, again, a cute
difference from my Mexican friend, and continued to grow as I fondled him,
finding him one percent or so removed from hairless.
"Do you tell Jun when it happens?" I asked.
"Yes," the boy managed to whisper, now hissing openly as I
began masturbating him. That was okay: "But it's different with you, I'm
not so sure."
"It's okay, either way," I whispered, looking up and again
longing to molest him under his shirt. Peeking down at my watch, careful
not to see him in the process, I advised Hand we had thirty-five minutes
before duty called. He was able to nod in response, something of a feat I
remember thinking to myself at the time, considering how hard and big he'd
become at my first experimental touch.
It was novel being able to speak to my partner. Jose and I
communicated admirably, jokes and all, but not while we were making love.
"Do you want it to happen fast or more slowly?" I ventured to ask,
wondering if I was overstepping by exploiting the opportunity to say
something into saying too much.
"Really slowly," the boy responded readily. It was good to
hear his voice.
"Is that how it happened the first time?" I quizzed. He'd
given permission and I hoped I was not abusing it.
"Yes," the child responded, "we were in a safe place and
had all night, so he really made it last for both of us."
"Cool," I said, "how old were you?"
"Ten," Hank replied, "two years ago. When my mom left my
dad. Things got messed up for a few weeks, not emotionally, none of that
crap, he wanted to write, she wanted more security, so they went their
separate ways with minimal bloodshed, but meantime, they thought it would
be good to have a baby-sitter, so they got Robbie Tucker from down the
street, he was seventeen then, to guard el twerp and his little sister, six
at the time."
"Do you think they knew what was going to happen?" I asked,
having taken just enough of a rhythm with the boy to lubricate the friction
between our bodies with a steady flow of his seminal fluid.
"Sometimes I think the whole thing was arranged so it WOULD
happen," the boy noted, "because Robbie was cute and neat and once they
spied him they had to find some way to employ him."
"If you drive a certain kind of car," I said, "you could
say the Ford works in mysterious ways." We were already friends enough
that lame could be taken as lame and the child I was masturbating against
my teen chest rolled his eyes and said nothing. Awesome. Too friendly,
there's a partnership killer near the top of the A list. Clingy,
obsequious, flattering and phony  as the line goes: "Don't laugh at my
jokes too much."
We didn't need to talk at all. Things were going better
than well; Henry stayed rock hard in my hand and was satisfied at being
kept ten heartbeats from the edge, trusting that there would be completion,
a climax to our stolen hour together. But it was a coin with two sides.
Thee was no reason not to talk, either.
"Can I ask what you and Jun do when you come back here?" I
queried.
"Okay," the boy whispered, "then I can tell you about
Robbie Tucker."
Wow, were ever birds of a feather. And yet, how little
difference it made. He was harder against my chest and more urgent than
Jose, would be a better lover, but again, so what? We could have been
sitting across the isle from each other talking about model planes, or
sailing ships, with an identical vibrational pattern and compatibility
factor. Every institution from the courts to the press lauds the committed
father, uncle, cousin, or in-law; paints him as heroic for his dedication
and commitment, yet let the man not be related to the child, to the extent
of fourth cousin twice removed, and the hammer falls and the pervert is
outed. "Oh, he's my step sister's nephew," answers all, nods, and away
goes the car. "Oh, he's my little friend." Oops, the car has a rear-seat
passenger. The irony and paradox  plenty of both  is that the
opposite would be just as reprehensible; dozens of boys turning up at the
prom with male teachers, man boy couples common at dances and socials,
public displays of affection replete with giggles and whispering, they
wouldn't undermine our culture  how would that be possible in the Age
of Obesity  but it would be Horner's-Corners monotonous after the
`shock' wore off, an aesthetic only tolerable to those born and bred with
it.
Whatever.
"Does Jun molest you in your underpants?" I asked, "or do
you just come back and strip like jocks."
"We alternate," the boy whispered, panting deliberately but
otherwise maintaining well. "Some days he plays like I'm a little boy in
the library, as I was when Robbie Tucker came in that day and said he was
going to be baby-sitting us. Then he plays with me a lot, like Robbie did
when he took me back in the stacks. The next time, since we know the best
parts happen when he has me naked, we strip as soon as the last passenger
is out of sight."
"How far have you gone together?" I asked.
"Sort of half far," the boy whispered breathlessly. "He's
beautiful, but, you know, not exactly huge, so he's been inside me twice,
but just from the back. But it's half, because I don't feel about him
enough to let him do things inside my mouth, or rape me anally while I look
into his eyes. I never did them with Robbie, either, and he was too mature
to mount me without hurting me. These are both things I want with you,
from the minute I came through the door."
"With a start like that," I said, "it would definitely be
ill-advised to allow sentiment further access."
"Cold, distant, and mechanical," the boy agreed.
"Scratching an itch," I added.
"Primitive as fleas," the boy said.
At this point, I remember wondering if perversion could
actually be a distraction. Might we not enjoy each other more, fully
clothed and laces tied? Of course, the little joke here was that we were
in fact fully clothed, shoes and sneakers properly bound. It was having
the nerve to dally in such intellectual limbo that made me know I was a
writer. Who else would care  clothes on, clothes off, are you going to
molest the kid, or not? The difference between craft and art is making you
care; not obsessing over nuance and dithering over issues, those are
elevator facets, everyone feels them, but, instead, tuning you up as to the
importance of unimportance, the vitality of triviality, and the place of
entertainment, as a substitute for psychosis in a complex and convoluted
world. I finished out this little train of thought by recanting half of
it. Masturbating Hank's hidden penis inside my shirt was high excellence
in the sensory department, and, while admittedly it would not add to the
quality of our friendship, anticipation of it happening again would
certainly tend to focus so there would be more to us in quantity if not
quality.
"How did it start with Jun?" I asked.
"Rain," the boy said. "So he said I could wait for it to
stop. I thought he was cute, so I showed him some pictures from my
backpack. Henny, my sister. What bonded us was that he had pictures of
Angel, his sister, same age as mine. `What will be cool,' he said, `is
when computer photography gets good enough to use at home, then I could
take the pictures of her I really want  you know, no nosy photo lab.'
That kind of put a stop to the conversation for a minute, and he was cool
about letting me adjust. Even after a couple of minutes I guess I was
still kinda' blushing, which really gave me away, and he asked me if I'd
like to take secret photos of my little sister. That got us really
talking, you know, not saying much, but yawning and communicating at high
speed. I told him about Robbie Tucker and he asked me lots of questions.
When he was sure of what I was talking about, he got out of his seat and
walked to the back of the bus. I followed him. He asked if I wanted to
let him pretend he was Robbie for a little while and asked me to guide him.
I told him Robbie had started by standing close behind me and rubbing my
neck and shoulders. `Like this?" he asked, and, since I had really real
memories of what happened at the library, I told him Yes, and we whispered
a lot while he started."
The boy's story had a good beginning, so I encouraged him
to continue, suggesting we play the same game in his bedroom that night.
"Yeah," he responded, "secrecy's for the birds, they've got cats to worry
about. I figured that out right away, because he told me about what he and
Angel did together, and I told him about the first night Robbie Tucker
stayed over with us, and it made it more exciting, because, you know, we
had over half an hour and didn't have to hurry."
Jose had been active with others during our relationship,
but by inclination and because of the language barrier, his stories were
matter of fact, not stories at all, and we'd never even gone into graphic
detail telling each other abou8t our first times. The difference was nice,
well, honestly, more than nice. It's taken decades of practice, as a
writer, to learn the value of understatement, that softness equals volume,
and hype means another reader for another writer, so I won't go on and on
and on about the surging electrical excitement of beginning a sexual
relationship with a precocious and somewhat experienced pre teen. Best
leaving the reader his part in the story, which is figuring it out for
himself. Part of my job, as a writer, is assisting the reader by requiring
him to use his or her imagination as little as possible, and this means
telling everything in the greatest possible detail, not only the physical
part, you know, the feeling of the head of his slick and tawny hardness of
his large but juvenile penis against the left nipple of my own boyish
chest, but the behavioral side, the psychological side, though the word
portends neurosis, and the emotional side, though the word has degraded in
its meaning through frequent association with the l-word. All of the
above, in explicit detail, so the story comes across clearly and exactly
allowing the reader's thoughts to wander because he's not constantly having
to exercise his imagination on weaving tendrils of images into complete and
memorable scenarios. There was time for this in Dickens's day, and two
dense pages could go to a hat, but now there are computer games and sports
with replays, so the deviant has to compete or lose his audience, whether
it's a writer crafting work for wide distribution or a twelve year old boy
trying to further his relationship with a boyish young man. Since
voyeurism is difficult to rationalize you end up with paragraphs like this,
asides that might appeal to one reader in several dozen, because, while it
is true that few will want more, your job, as a writer, is to please all.
I've read this (in my own work) but tend to reject it. Nifty, alone, after
all, has over fifty thousand stories, so the reader has a zillion
alternatives, and it's the other extreme that actually comes into play: the
awkward bumptiousness of a writer who doesn't much care if he pleases
anybody or not. I know bringing a host of literary predicaments and
creative challenges into relief doesn't solve any of them, but, guess what,
it sure makes dear reader happy to get back to the story.
That brings up which story? Robbie Tucker's whispered
invitation to Hank at the library? Story / library  get it? Ha, ha.
What happened on his first overnight at Hank and Henny (William's) house.
Jun's story of his sister, hearsay though it might turn out to be? Jun
with Hank during the thundershower? What was going to happen between the
two of us the moment his bedroom (or the bathroom) door was locked? What
might have happened to his, Hank's, mother to make her so tolerant and
wise? The dread of the real writer is he's always on the verge of
launching off into an epic, crippled by his skill as would an athlete be
crippled by a compulsion to run everywhere and thus running into accidents
and injury, and this hazard has markedly increased with the advent of
alternative Web archives, freeing the wordsmith of the necessity of
inventing the mother of all plots to draw his reader through five hundred
or a thousand pages. Not only has this happened to your correspondent,
it's happened six times, most lately to the tune of four hundred thousand
words. Never again. I'm a retired novelist, a slugger nonpareil now
content to hit for average. Therefore, we're not going to the library,
though, if we did, this is what might have occurred.
"Hi, Hank," the tall redhead whispered as he joined the ten
year old in the reading room. He looked quickly around, not furtively, it
was a library, you were meant to whisper, or not even that if you might
disturb someone. Seeing the librarian was out of earshot, he continued,
sitting next to the boy, "have you heard the news? They're going to pull
it off. I'm meant to come and play big daddy ugly bones for you guys while
things get sorted out."
"For sure?" the schoolboy asked, smiling brightly.
"Done deal," the wiry, athletic mid-teen affirmed,
"reporting for duty at four this afternoon, and it'll take two flat tires
on my bike to make me that late."
"I'll get home early, too," Hank promised.
"It's going to be way over the top hanging out with you
guys," Robbie said, mindful to keep his voice at a soft whisper.
"And I'll bet you let me stay up to 9:02," the younger boy
teased.
"Flexible, that's me," Robbie responded, "open to mischief,
coloring outside the lines, and controlling dildacity, whatever that is, so
neither `rent, nor neighbor, nor teacher, nor cop raises so much as a
single eyebrow so much as a quarter of an inch."
"Nine-o-five? the younger boy asked, play hope evident in
his big schoolboy eyes.
"It's not when you go to bed, moron," the teen whispered,
"it's what happens before you're tucked in. Specifically, alternatives to
the numbing uselessness of television."
"What kind of alternatives," the boy asked as they both
checked the desk to be sure of the perfectly nice dragon who liked the
place, appropriately, tomb like. She was still at a distance, and, in an
era when even "Mad" failed to intrigue young readers, the vestigial
institution was otherwise vacant (all six Harry Potter volumes having been
checked out).
"Reading," Robbie said. "It's payment. Tradition in the
best families. Reading to instill literacy, and other activities to
instill knowledge. They go kind of hand in hand, because you can spend a
couple of hours, reading, where the other items on the agenda can be very
fatiguing and leave you temporarily drained, exhausted, and ready to
sleep."
"I didn't know they made a portable Bowflex," the ten year
old said.
"At my house," Robbie Tucker noted, "we skip rope like
fighters, if you're interested in exercise, I can bring one over."
"I was just pretending," the cute kid admitted, "but what,
you know, are you talking about, or am I too young to know?"
"It is super awesomely mature," Robbie replied, "but that's
what you're young for, and I was a little younger than you, and it didn't
kill me."
"And it takes an hour?" the child asked.
"It could," the teen allowed, "or it could be finished in a
few minutes. That's kind of what I wanted to talk to you about here at the
library, where there's lots of privacy. There's stuff we could do together
that would make it last longer at eight o'clock, when the reading's done."
The boys looked at each other for a long moment. "Will you be really
gentle?" the younger male asked, closing his book and slowly rising to his
feet.
"There's only one thing that hurts," Robbie assured him,
"and the school library is no place for that monkey business... we might
never get to it." He rose, too, taking one of the younger boy's books.
"I'll shelve this while you do the one you have, then we can meet way at
the back," he whispered. They gave each other a sharp look, and headed
into the stacks.
"Isn't it hard to imagine so many books on other subjects?"
the teen asked as he came up close behind the ten year old, placing his
hands gently on the coltish child's slim waist and pulling him gently to
him. "And the place is empty. Do you suppose writers will ever take the
hint?"
"They could make the world better," Hank whispered with a
nod as he let the mature male pull free his shirt tales. He gasped as he
felt his mature partner's hands slide over his belly, then work their way
up over his now heaving chest. "Much better."
"Has this happened to you before?" Robbie quizzed,
whispering softly in Hank's left ear.
"No," the boy replied. "It's molesting, isn't it?"
"The first part," his friend said, "there's obviously a lot
more, and I guess technically I'd have to go lower with my hands to really
molest you; so far, I could be rubbing you with sunscreen or bug dope."
"I've never really been worried about being infested with
fleas," Hank said, "but it might be a good idea to be sure I'm protected,
you know, everywhere."
"You want it in your mouth?" the older boy deadpanned.
"No," the kid said, playing along with his amusing friend,
"I've got teeth to protect my gums; I was thinking of somewhere else,
seeing as fleas like, you know, hair, and, you know, I'm not as young as I
used to be, so, you know, why take chances?"
"But I'm not really applying repellent," Robbie reminded
the boy.
"I've never thought you were repellent," the younger wit
said, "quite the opposite, in fact."
"Good," the older boy whispered, "then I won't be a hunter
gatherer in search of half a thimble full of wild game, but, rather, I can
take on the more lofty role of inspector."
"They have some detective stories here," Hank noted, "so I
guess another private eye can't do any harm."
"How do you feel about kissing?" Robbie wanted to know.
"Terrible," his young friend whispered back, "I'm not being
kissed and it's nothing but heartache and misery."
"Do you want to wait just a minute and we can be
bare-chested against each other while we experiment?" the teen asked.
"Yes," Hank said. It took some moments for the two to
strip to the waist, then another half minute to pile six inches of books
under each of the smaller boy's feet, but in half a lifetime they were
facing each other, arms at their sides, inches apart.
"Hi," Robbie whispered huskily.
"Hi," the young colt responded, blushing.
Robbie Tucker used both hands to draw the handsome face, at
the level of his own, to within an inch. "Let's touch where we're naked,
first," he suggested, arching slightly. Hank did the same and that was how
they came together, just the slightest waving, dancing contact as they
gasped and panted at the sensations coursing through their aroused bodies.
It was adventure, squared, and thrills galore. Chills to the marrow of
their young bones, the boy avid for the maturity and promise of his older
partner, the teen likewise intoxicated with the juvenile's extreme youth
and slim delicacy.
"Isn't kissing really special?" Hand asked, his forehead
now gently against Robbie's as they wallowed in the sensuality of each
other as well as the allied excitement of utilizing the educational
facility above and beyond its intended purpose.
"Very special," the older child affirmed.
"Can we do it naked?" Hank asked, "so we don't spoil it?"
"Do you know what happens with an older boy?" Robbie said.
"Just in theory," the younger boy answered.
"Well, it isn't just a drop or two or a puff of fairy
dust," Robbie explained, "it's kind of a lot, and it can kind of get
everywhere, so if we're going to kiss while we're naked, we've got to have
something to clean up, afterwards."
"If you tell me exactly what happens," Hank said, "I think
I might have an answer."
"Well, you know," the older boy explained, "it kind of
spurts, maybe two feet the first three or four times, - that depends 
and then there's more, even if it isn't quite so dramatic, and that goes on
for, you know, maybe a minute, and even at the end, more comes out until
the very end."
"But it all comes from one place, right?" the kid said.
"Yeah," Robbie acknowledged.
"So if something blocked it, then it wouldn't go showering
all over everything, right?"
"Right."
"Then we've got choices," Hank said.
"We do?" the older boy asked.
"Think of it," Hank went on, "a library, a place of
fulfillment and entertainment, yet blocked to the average kid by a few
terrible writers who stunt the love of reading with their Holden Caufields
and Piggys."
"Awesome, dude," whispered the teen, "to quote Leonard
Bernstein, `There's a place for us.'"
Boys will be boys, which is why it's such freaking fun to
write about the critters. The pair needed no further words, were two
needles in a single groove. For added excitement, they moved a stack apart
to slip out of their shoes, socks, and pants. Then, dressed only in their
underwear, they were the first children in the world to play a certain
game. It wasn't a huge library, but did have a dozen rows of shelves.
"Robbie?" Hank stage-whispered, "you go to the As and I'll go to the Zs,
then we can creep sideways, just guided by the authors directly in front of
us, and meet at the worst book ever published."
There was a moment's silence, then another rasping whisper:
"I wouldn't trade you for a million dollars a month," Robbie said.
"I shouldn't be telling tales in school, or divulging
family secrets," the ten year old whispered back, "but Henny said something
to the same effect about you."
Why did they like each other so much? Because they
recognized, one in the other, deeper traits of character than were to be
found in the average. Any other boy he knew, given the present
circumstances, would have immediately joined Hank, and in a hot white
minute it would have been over for both juveniles. Instead they padded
barefoot on the carpeting to their respective starting points, dropped to
their knees, and, eyes focused s foot ahead, began moving. Nor was their
game merely the idle whim of the childish mind, for it bode nothing less
than indoctrination into the fickle world of random chance. Suppose, for
example, one chose an author whose last name happened to begin with a G,
and another whose surname began with an S. Why, they'd never meet. On the
other hand, if they chose G and S in the reverse order, yes, they'd meet,
but only to sidle by each other in fulfillment of their quest for the worst
possible book. Picking  one chance in twenty-six  the same letter,
by coincidence, might leave them like Evangeline and her lover, inches
apart for eternity. It was an exotic test of compatibility, frivolous on
the outside, but a story for the grandchildren Hank's mind went to a
superbly written television ad, and I'm cheating here a bit with the time
line, but I don't want to leave out a rare tribute to a contemporary
writer, where the kids are talking to their gramps on the porch. He's
telling them about the joys of riding a motorcycle. The little boy asks if
he ever really owned a Harley. "No," he replies, "I spent the money on
aluminum siding." Both children de-camp to go inside and see what
grandma's doing. "Not for me," Hank murmured to himself as he inched
along, "when I'm that age, I want my lap full of kids."
This is a scene that could be milked half to death in a
novel. Maybe someone enters the stacks, for example, so the playing
children, sensing the presence, end up in a high-stakes game of
hide-and-seek, all Keystone Cops and Chinese fire drills. Maybe the
drop-dead new security officer would happen by, and poof, more story than
room to tell it. There could be a fire drill, or teen lovers looking for a
place to make out, and the whole alphabet to play with  (or has that
been done?). In the end it happened none of these ways, they played,
moving slowly along, and couldn't help sensing each other as Hank reached
the Gs and Robbie, the I's. They may have been approaching literary hell,
getting Warmer, as kids say in games, but it seemed to make little
difference. H was H and both had learned from their parents not to burn
their eyes on the beard with the knit sweater. Yes, it was Hell, and yes,
it was Hemingway, and yes it was "The Old Man and the Sea."
"We're doing the school a service," Robbie noted, adding
that it wasn't much of one, because the crummy thing hadn't been check out
in the proceeding two years [which brings up this little story. The best
book I ever read in my life was C.S. Forester's "The Good Shepherd",
nothing to do with sheep or bible, but the story of a destroyer on the
Halifax / Murmansk run. In twenty-five years, it had never been checked
out. (You bet I stole it.)]. Even with such a salient motive, both boys
felt kind of creepy; neither was one tenth of a percent a vandal and would
rather spray a tagger with buckshot than busses with paint, but they were
both boys, envelope weary and on the lookout for any prank that lived up to
the physicians' code of first doing no harm.
"Do you know how to do it?" Robbie asked.
"I don't even know how to say it," the ten year old
replied, "just that somewhere there's a company that sells a lot of dolls
to the liberals who dominate our education, so it's dolls, dolls, dolls
like a cheap summer camp has canoes, canoes, canoes."
"What does an expensive summer camp have?" Robbie asked,
not wanting to derail anything, but nonetheless intrigued, since they were,
after all, at the bonding stage.
"A big library and several darkrooms, with counselors not
too uptight to spend time alone, sans light, with willing boys. I plan to
attend one soon, and I'd be much beholdin' if you'd join Henny and me."
"At least no fear of drowning," the older boy allowed.
"No," Hank said, "they do have canoes, and I like them
fine, but they're very finite, and the library and photo lab aren't."
That was enough of that, and by accord they shelved the
discussion. The short answer was Hank didn't know how, and the bright side
was that he was in a perfect position to learn. They got the offensive
tome from the shelf and laid it open on the carpet. Robbie experimented
with positions and found he was most comfortable on his knees, bracing
himself on the shelving, his legs widely spread. Hank also jockeyed
around, finally coming to rest at the teen athlete's right flank, his left
arm around the older boy's waist, his right hand adjusting the open book so
it lay against the base of the bottommost shelf.. "That's perfect," Robbie
said, standing and pulling his young friend to his feet. "This is the way
it usually happens," he whispered, standing behind the child and running
his hands over his naked flanks and chest, then ever lower on the boy's
tensing belly until his fingers grazed the band of Hank's white underpants.
"Pretend your sister is watching us," he whispered as his right hand went
slowly down between the long, coltish legs, first outside the white briefs,
then, as they both panted quietly, inside. "This is what I want you to
do," the older boy whispered, slightly stroking the ten year old's diamond
of a four-inch boner.
"Okay," Hank whispered, shaking in his partner's arms.
Robbie gently turned him, and the boy, returning to his knees, pulled down
the teen's boxer shorts, lingering over freeing the seventeen year old's
fully mature penis. "Will you hurt her?" was his first comment.
"No," Robbie assured the boy, "I'm no zoo boy, just a
little more developed than average. Girls can take an average male
comfortably at six or seven, and she's eight year old. Plus, I expect I'll
be on the gentle side Time was running on. They were more at the clinical
stage than the romantic, so, without further conversation, Robbie once
again braced himself over the book and Henry now used his right hand the
way the older boy had demonstrated.
"Say what you're doing," Robbie whispered, coaxing his
virgin partner.
"Masthebating," the boy said. Robbie corrected him, and he
got it perfect the second try. He was likewise alert with his right hand,
instinctively laving the mature boy's circumcised penis with seminal fluid
as he used slow, firm, steady strokes, carrying each fully to the base
where he shook his hand slightly before repeating the cycle.
Only a minute passed before Hank could plainly feel the
rapidly rising tension in his teen lover. "It will be in just a few
seconds if you want to watch," he advised. Hank lowered his head to open
the view, stroking just slightly more actively, and waited. "What a betting
game this would be," he thought to himself, trying to sense in the young
adult the precise moment he'd see something, much like he'd close his eyes
at the end of a flight to see if he cold tell exactly when the wheels of
the airplane touched the runway. Several times, already, he would have
lost, knowing, from the heat of his panting partner, it had to be now, but
each time the surge passed, only to be followed quickly by a more dramatic
crescendo of hot, teen lust.
"I'm cumming," the older boy finally whispered softly.
Hank checked the focus of each eye, then had several long moments to wait.
Within a quarter minute, Robbie repeated his warning, and this time there
wasn't an ounce of truth omitted. Somehow the younger boy knew exactly
what to do and as he felt a hard, fast swelling in his partner, he jerked
his hand to the base of the young adult, holding him tight. In any other
venue, the child would have simply kept stroking, letting the teen seed
shower where it would, but, though it was short of checking out a white
whale, they still had a mission, so both locked into a shuddering freeze.
It's a little frightening to give a literary icon more play
in a single scene than he achieved in his career, but it's doable. Both
boys found it not only that, but easy. Robbie's cum began with a loose
spatter of random wetness, but in seconds he settled down to a hard, steady
pulsing, sending gout after gout across the two open pages as the ten year
old stared speechlessly. In two minutes they slowly regained their feet,
Hank braced himself, legs spread, and his mature partner took him gently
from behind, the semen on his right hand bringing the sensitive child to a
softly squealing climax in just minutes. They retrieved the defamed book,
feeling a little abashed at their tribute to a drunken suicide who wasn't
around to defend himself, and closed it with an appropriately slimy squish.
"If anyone ever does check it out," Hank noted, "they'll just think an
elephant sneezed."
That's why I like writing about boys.
Our time was running out. Indeed, we'd caught a bit of a
break because the Fullerton depot had remained inert during our entire time
together; always the chance another driver would want to chat, or a
supervisor would cruise in, and, even though we were both fully dressed,
the explanations could get complicated. (He had an asthma attack and
couldn't stop sneezing? Then why were you flushed and short of breath?
We'll check with his doctor. Do you have any handkerchiefs or tissue?
Etc.}
"Did Henny like her story?" I asked, making several
assumptions that turned out to be on the money.
"Tale and teller," my twelve year old friend said, "it was
a riot, and not half so. Half way through "Flowers in the Attic," she was
in his lap, squirming and attentive at the same time, if you follow. By
the time eight o'clock finally arrived, and nothing against the book, we
both loved it, Henny was in her panties and had finally coaxed Robbie's
left hand inside."
"Did he take her while you watched?" I asked, very much in
interest of concluding the prologue so we could start Chapter One in a few
hours.
"Like totally," the boy said, "right there on the leather
sofa in the living room. I helped him strip, and Henny helped me, and
every hand in town lowered her panties. When we were all naked we took a
time out and stood by the sofa, looking at each other for four or five
minutes, fantasizing. Then Henny took his hand and drew him down on top of
her. She locked her left ankle over the back of the couch,, and stretched
her right foot out on the carpet. Robbie knelt between her legs, then I
shuffled up to the edge of the sofa so neither of them would have to use
their hands. He braced like in the up position, and she held him gently by
his flanks. I had to experiment a little because it was my first time near
a girl, but by rubbing in circles and up and down, and finding where she
was wettest, it only took two or three minutes before she squealed and he
grunted. `Keep your hand there, if you want," he whispered to me, and that
was so far away you can't catch it with any kind of words; feeling him
surge against her, so gently, and her little body rising to him, totally
excited but really scared, too. And it just went on and on. Minutes, just
for him to really get so it was obvious he was inside her. They'd try,
then he'd smile down at her, and they'd both relax. Sometimes he'd rest
against her chest while she ran her fingers up and down his spine. She
kept looking at me and sort of glowing. It was awesome not having sex with
her, but sharing it. I experimented with masturbating her with the hand
that was between their bodies, and pretty soon I found I could stimulate
them from any extended lethargy in just a few seconds. So," he continued,
"this went on for half an hour, you know, thanks to Mr. Hemingway."
He was about as cute as a boy could be. I listened avidly,
molesting him in rough synchronization with the rising intensity of his
story. Nor was I totally committed to the physical aspect of our new
relationship, because I couldn't help thinking how appropriate it was much
of the story had taken place in a library. In his own probably not even
partially innocent way Henry Williams had skewered two literary `greats' on
a single blade, and had, for all time, you guessed it, shed the light of
common sense on the importance of being Ernest.
"Finally they were together," Hank went on. "Henny was
smiling shyly at me and Robbie pulled me against both of them, guiding me
so my head was on sis's belly and I was looking down at her thighs. Robbie
rose high on his arms again, and started moving. Henny started mewing and
lunging up to him, sweating, panting, and her head lolling from side to
side. `Hank,' she whispered to me, `he's trying to get me pregnant.' `I
think you're  trying  to get a baby from him,' I said back to her.
I don't know what might have happened otherwise, but our baby talk made
things pretty hopeless for Robbie. We could both sense he was holding back
for Henny, trying to make her first time as special as possible, but we
were to immature to fully appreciate his reserve. Anyway, he didn't say
anything, just froze hard against her, rigid as steel but shaking like a
leaf. Henny sort of gasped, but just froze, too. I pressed my left ear
hard to her belly. I knew I couldn't hear anything, but I did feel it,
even through her straining muscles, like a lions heart, you know, with a
slow but hard beat. What I couldn't believe, even after the library, was
how long it went on. I mean, I didn't time it, but I know it was two
minutes, not as hard as at first, and after half a minute, I couldn't feel
it against my cheek anymore, but I could see his sperm still flowing out
between them."
And he exceeded even his stalwart friend. My chest had
been getting slicker by the second, and that, too, had gone on and on as
he'd gasped and shuddered to the end of his tale. We separated after
another couple of minutes. I found an empty container of chocolate milk
under a seat and took it forward to the trash bag, handy in case anyone
questioned my we shirt  very wet shirt. "Some fighting cats dashed
onto the bus," I would have said, "and I spilled my drink." Never had to
use it.
We sat several minutes back up front. He double checked
that I had the right phone number, was glad of the extra bonus of the fact
that I had an eighty-three horsepower motorcycles on which I'd stashed
almost thirty thousand miles, half in Mexico, the previous year, and we
parted for the moment, fellows well met, indeed.
THE END
About the author.
Thomas Cochran Emerson is entering his third year as a Web contributor.
Under the pen name Feather Touch he published "Jimmy and Frogger", "The
Flyyy", "Dennis the...", "Ropeyarn", "Creative Camp", "Blissy's Song",
"Michelle's First Secret" and "Michelle's Second Secret". As R. Forbes
Emerson, he has published "Hollywood Stories", "Santa Fe Stories",
"Stonington (Me.) Stories", "The Tarzan Mushroom Hunters", and, most
recently, four hundred thousand words of "One Fish at a Time", a work in
progress. All his files can be found in the "Nifty.org" Archive. Most are
listed under Bisexual, Adults/Young Friends. Others may be found under
Bisexual Camping and one or two may be filed under the heading sf/fantasy.
"Boxers or Briefs?" is listed under Gay Incest, and his latest, "Rebecca",
under Bi Incest. In total his contributions run to some 1.1 million words.
Mr. Emerson lives in Belize, "slightly addicted to the Caribbean." While
his stories never cheat in upholding the alternative tradition, readers
sallying forth with optimistic outlooks would be well advised to always
download alternative material. It can be many miles of rough road between
this boy losing his underpants and that girl letting big brother experiment
under her training bra. Yes, you have been warned.
Emerson was born in his ancestral home of Concord, Massachusetts, in 1946,
"The Year of the Porsche," in his words. An absolute devotee of the craft
of leading English astray, thus providing gainful employment to those who
would lead it back, he admits to being a hot-house artist with the modern
word processor his soil, water, air, light, and enabling nutrient. "Hell,
all I need then is a seed," he says.
Directly descended from the leading activist of the Revolutionary War, and
scion of a family that includes the most quoted man in history, his poet
and philosopher great great grandfather; the CEO of AT&T during the heyday
of Bell Labs and Western Electric, and other luminaries ranging from two
governors (Winthrop and Bradford) of the Plymouth Colony to the founder of
American Standard, he views his (native) countrymen as his subjects, and
writes of and to them accordingly. His hobbies are limited to photography
and trying to explain Samantha, his fifteen-year-old girlfriend, to an
unamused father. Since flattery got him everywhere, he likes the
occasional reader letter.
Quote: "Was the phrase `adult entertainment' coined just for me?"
Posted by Thomas@btl.net.
xxx